"And our mutual friend, Mr. John C. Calhoun Bivens, is presiding?"
"Why, Jim, how could you be so absurd," she protested indignantly. "I've been saving money for a month to give Nan this chance to return some courtesies she has received from rich friends. I need Mr. Bivens's money to pay the rent of this big house. But any attention on his part to Nan would be disgusting to me beyond measure."
"Yet he's the sensation in high finance just now," Stuart said, with an unconscious sneer. "They say he's destined to become a multi-millionaire."
"Come, come, Jim, it's not like you to be nasty to me. You know as well as I do his origin in North Carolina. His people are the veriest trash. He was at college with you——"
"And how did you know that?"
"Not from you, of course. You've never mentioned his name in your life. He told me."
"Oh, Bivens told you!"
"Yes, when I asked him if he knew you he told me with a touch of genuine pride that you were friends. He thinks you are going to be the greatest lawyer in New York. And I told him we'd known that for a long time."
Stuart turned his head to hide a smile.
"But of course he's not in Nan's social set. I told her the day he came that we would treat him politely but draw the line strictly on any efforts he may make to pass the limits of acquaintance. The men who associate with Nan must belong to her father's world—to your world, Jim—the world of good breeding and culture. I've dinned this into Nan's ears from babyhood. You know yourself it was the greatest joy of my life the day she told me of your love."